Steemit how can this thing be workable long term?

[iamnotback]

I have agreed and disagreed with sean-king's "one dimensional/factor" analysis:

https://steemit.com/steem/@sean-king/got-a-problem-with-steem-s-reward-system-read-this#@anonymint/re-sean-king-got-a-problem-with-steem-s-reward-system-read-this-20160719t184300483z

Please upvote if you agree with my point.

unusualfacts30, my linked comment post above addresses your rant.

What a great guy. Sean-king upvoted my post above. Note I had added to the end of that comment post. I think I made a very important point there about voting not being free of mental computational cost.

Edit: I added even more to the end of that comment post:

The curator rewards are such a small fraction of the voter’s Steem Power, that only those with significant Steem Power are economically motivated by curator rewards. Thus we could posit that minnow voters have no great mental calculation cost when voting since they can vote their conscience without significant curator reward implications. Although the minnows don’t individually have much impact on the payout rewards, collectively they do since there are many more of them than there are whales. Thus we can conclude the white paper is more or less correct w.r.t. to minnows and w.r.t. to whales, the votes are not a replacement for micropayments because the whale’s vote doesn’t involve an insignificant economics value.

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[iamnotback]

The charts are still down, but someone posted this info a while ago. Obviously the downtime has effected traffic the past few days:

https://steemit.com/marketing/@dragonho/3-month-steemit-com-it-is-time-to-prepare-some-numbers-so-that-we-can-market-them

That gives me no data on stickiness.

There is also this, but it is a week old: https://steemit.com/steemit/@gavvet/where-steemit-adoption-is-going-to-the-mooooon

None of that is giving me the necessary data to determine the attrition rate and half-life of an active user account.

"Returning users" doesn't tell us if they are "recently newbies who have replaced older users who abandoned the site". In other words, as usership grows, so does returning users, but that tells us nothing about whether these are old loyal users. All I see is the vague (and frankly ambiguous) statement:

Average Loyal users on site per day was about 650 before the 4th July....
It has now doubled to over 1300 per day

That they've disabled most of the reporting functionality of this site:

https://steemle.com/charts.php

May indicate they are wanting to hide the detailed stats. I expect the attrition rate is not good. I have some ideas on how to improve it. It would help a lot if I could know what it is now.

I went hunting but I can't seem to find simple instructions on how to obtain the raw data I need:

https://steemit.com/steem/@jabbasteem/announcing-steemle-com--providing-steem-data-statistics-search-and-api
https://steemit.com/steem/@xeroc/steem-api
https://steemit.com/theoretical/@theoretical/how-to-use-the-steem-api

[CoinHoarder]

That they've disabled most of the reporting functionality of this site:

https://steemle.com/charts.php

They haven't disabled anything. Those statistics are from the blockchain. Detailed site statistics are not available unless they happen to post them.

[jl777]

The charts are still down, but someone posted this info a while ago. Obviously the downtime has effected traffic the past few days:

https://steemit.com/marketing/@dragonho/3-month-steemit-com-it-is-time-to-prepare-some-numbers-so-that-we-can-market-them

That gives me no data on stickiness.

There is also this, but it is a week old: https://steemit.com/steemit/@gavvet/where-steemit-adoption-is-going-to-the-mooooon

None of that is giving me the necessary data to determine the attrition rate and half-life of an active user account.

"Returning users" doesn't tell us if they are "recently newbies who have replaced older users who abandoned the site". In other words, as usership grows, so does returning users, but that tells us nothing about whether these are old loyal users. All I see is the vague (and frankly ambiguous) statement:

Average Loyal users on site per day was about 650 before the 4th July....
It has now doubled to over 1300 per day

That they've disabled most of the reporting functionality of this site:

https://steemle.com/charts.php

May indicate they are wanting to hide the detailed stats. I expect the attrition rate is not good. I have some ideas on how to improve it. It would help a lot if I could know what it is now.

I went hunting but I can't seem to find simple instructions on how to obtain the raw data I need:

https://steemit.com/steem/@jabbasteem/announcing-steemle-com--providing-steem-data-statistics-search-and-api
https://steemit.com/steem/@xeroc/steem-api
https://steemit.com/theoretical/@theoretical/how-to-use-the-steem-api

https://steemd.com/distribution has the raw data.

Shameless plug for my daily guessing game: https://steemit.com/money/@jl777/ann-daily-guessing-game-greater-than-guess-tomorrow-s-steem-price-closest-one-wins-half-the-blog-award-this-gets

Assuming it gets traction it should have either a positive or negative price correlation. either way it is useful

[iamnotback]

I have agreed and disagreed with sean-king's "one dimensional/factor" analysis:

https://steemit.com/steem/@sean-king/got-a-problem-with-steem-s-reward-system-read-this#@anonymint/re-sean-king-got-a-problem-with-steem-s-reward-system-read-this-20160719t184300483z

Please upvote if you agree with my point.

unusualfacts30, my linked comment post above addresses your rant.

What a great guy. Sean-king upvoted my post above. Note I had added to the end of that comment post. I think I made a very important point there about voting not being free of mental computational cost.

Edit: I added even more to the end of that comment post:

The curator rewards are such a small fraction of the voter’s Steem Power, that only those with significant Steem Power are economically motivated by curator rewards. Thus we could posit that minnow voters have no great mental calculation cost when voting since they can vote their conscience without significant curator reward implications. Although the minnows don’t individually have much impact on the payout rewards, collectively they do since there are many more of them than there are whales. Thus we can conclude the white paper is more or less correct w.r.t. to minnows and w.r.t. to whales, the votes are not a replacement for micropayments because the whale’s vote doesn’t involve an insignificant economics value.

I've concluded the minnows always can vote their conscience and ditto the largest whales, yet the problem remains that the dominant game theory is the most upvoted posts will also attract the most upvotes in a vortex of one-size-fits-all:

https://steemit.com/gametheory/@biophil/what-s-a-minnow-to-do-the-game-theory-of-steem-part-4#@anonymint/re-biophil-re-anonymint-re-biophil-what-s-a-minnow-to-do-the-game-theory-of-steem-part-4-20160719t212322332z

Again the solution appears to be the one I blogged about which earned me $7000:

https://steemit.com/steemit/@anonymint/improving-steem-s-rankings-to-cater-to-diverse-content-preferences

This is already a phenomenon seen all over social media. Look at Twitter, for example, where the only metrics of success are likes and retweets. Even there, content is dominated by garbage "parody" accounts, who all repost the same stuff. Why are these accounts the most popular? Well, on a platform like Twitter, people are rewarded via followers and notifications for playing a part of the majority. It's the same reason why you only see conservative view points ridiculed and progressive ones hailed. The best content strays too far from the norm to make up the most exposed content.

You can see this everywhere. Hell, look at top movie lists. The Shawshank Redemption routinely lands #1 on user generated lists that consist of voting for what you like. So does Pulp Fiction. Are these the best two movies ever? No, they aren't. So why do they always land on top? Because they are the goodest. Everyone likes these movies. It may not be everyone's favorite, but everyone likes it.

I was rewarded $7000 for proposing an algorithmic solution to the problem you lament:

[iamnotback]

https://steemd.com/distribution has the raw data.

I had explained upthread that data is insufficient and ambiguous w.r.t. to the half-life of the attrition rate:

The 10,000 number is accurate based on 7 day account activity from the steemd blockchain.

https://steemd.com/distribution

If the 3000 signups per day claim is correct, then they are seeing at least 60% abandoned accounts rate, which also is approximately corroborated by the loss of actives of newbies from all history to recent 7 days.

Only 28% of the weeks active are active on any given day. So the majority are not revisiting every day. Given the evidence of a high rate of attrition, it is possible that instead of gaining a set of sticky users which is 40% of the signups, instead what might be happening is after so many days, nearly 100% abandon the site and the new signups are replacing the lost people (mathematically plausible if the rate of signups has been increasing which would also mean the attrition rate is much higher than 60% when comparing recent 7 days to all history). Meaning that it is possible the site has no stickiness. We need see charts on users by age of account and activity in order to answer this question. Also to more accurately see how the rates might be changing over time.

The last 24 hours stats might be skewed by the downtime due to the hack.

[jeffthebaker]

I have agreed and disagreed with sean-king's "one dimensional/factor" analysis:

https://steemit.com/steem/@sean-king/got-a-problem-with-steem-s-reward-system-read-this#@anonymint/re-sean-king-got-a-problem-with-steem-s-reward-system-read-this-20160719t184300483z

Please upvote if you agree with my point.

unusualfacts30, my linked comment post above addresses your rant.

What a great guy. Sean-king upvoted my post above. Note I had added to the end of that comment post. I think I made a very important point there about voting not being free of mental computational cost.

Edit: I added even more to the end of that comment post:

The curator rewards are such a small fraction of the voter’s Steem Power, that only those with significant Steem Power are economically motivated by curator rewards. Thus we could posit that minnow voters have no great mental calculation cost when voting since they can vote their conscience without significant curator reward implications. Although the minnows don’t individually have much impact on the payout rewards, collectively they do since there are many more of them than there are whales. Thus we can conclude the white paper is more or less correct w.r.t. to minnows and w.r.t. to whales, the votes are not a replacement for micropayments because the whale’s vote doesn’t involve an insignificant economics value.

I've concluded the minnows always can vote their conscience and ditto the largest whales, yet the problem remains that the dominant game theory is the most upvoted posts will also attract the most upvotes in a vortex of one-size-fits-all:

https://steemit.com/gametheory/@biophil/what-s-a-minnow-to-do-the-game-theory-of-steem-part-4#@anonymint/re-biophil-re-anonymint-re-biophil-what-s-a-minnow-to-do-the-game-theory-of-steem-part-4-20160719t212322332z

Again the solution appears to be the one I blogged about which earned me $7000:

https://steemit.com/steemit/@anonymint/improving-steem-s-rankings-to-cater-to-diverse-content-preferences

This is already a phenomenon seen all over social media. Look at Twitter, for example, where the only metrics of success are likes and retweets. Even there, content is dominated by garbage "parody" accounts, who all repost the same stuff. Why are these accounts the most popular? Well, on a platform like Twitter, people are rewarded via followers and notifications for playing a part of the majority. It's the same reason why you only see conservative view points ridiculed and progressive ones hailed. The best content strays too far from the norm to make up the most exposed content.

You can see this everywhere. Hell, look at top movie lists. The Shawshank Redemption routinely lands #1 on user generated lists that consist of voting for what you like. So does Pulp Fiction. Are these the best two movies ever? No, they aren't. So why do they always land on top? Because they are the goodest. Everyone likes these movies. It may not be everyone's favorite, but everyone likes it.

I was rewarded $7000 for proposing an algorithmic solution to the problem you lament:

Interesting solution, and I do believe that if implemented correctly, this could fix the problem of the same old garbage getting voted for thousands of dollars.

The problem with your solution is that implementing it, while improving the quality of the platform as a whole, would not be in the best interests of the developers. Simply put, people are only using Steemit to make money. Nobody is saying "Wow, look at the quality of content on Steemit!" The ONLY draw to the platform is the profit possibilities. By fragmenting voting into niches, there will no longer be posts earning tens of thousands of dollars. People will see the dollar values going down of top posts (as now money is split more evenly between the topics) and assume the scam is starting to dry out. The longer they can pump this bubble, the better for the few at the top of the ecosystem.

[jl777]

https://steemd.com/distribution has the raw data.

I had explained upthread that data is insufficient and ambiguous w.r.t. to the half-life of the attrition rate:

The 10,000 number is accurate based on 7 day account activity from the steemd blockchain.

https://steemd.com/distribution

If the 3000 signups per day claim is correct, then they are seeing at least 60% abandoned accounts rate, which also is approximately corroborated by the loss of actives of newbies from all history to recent 7 days.

Only 28% of the weeks active are active on any given day. So the majority are not revisiting every day. Given the evidence of a high rate of attrition, it is possible that instead of gaining a set of sticky users which is 40% of the signups, instead what might be happening is after so many days, nearly 100% abandon the site and the new signups are replacing the lost people (mathematically plausible if the rate of signups has been increasing which would also mean the attrition rate is much higher than 60% when comparing recent 7 days to all history). Meaning that it is possible the site has no stickiness. We need see charts on users by age of account and activity in order to answer this question. Also to more accurately see how the rates might be changing over time.

The last 24 hours stats might be skewed by the downtime due to the hack.

I just look at latest 24 hours data 4,821 accounts and weekly 13,734 accounts

if those number keep going up then it is not at equilibrium yet

of course it is noisy data and to get a really accurate idea, the blockchain would need to be analyzed. however many people make more than one account, and recent hack incidents surely slowed some things down

[BlindMayorBitcorn]

There sure are a lot of big names participating in this...investment scenario. Anything for a buck. Right fellas?

[jeffthebaker]

There sure are a lot of big names participating in this...investment scenario. Anything for a buck. Right fellas?

That's because the money flows to the top. There are a handful of Steem-whales holding large amounts of SD and SP who are reaping the benefits of all the newbies tricked into thinking that they, too, can turn a profit. Ultimately they are just going to make money until people wisen up and stop buying into this massive bubble. At that point, they will either sell out, or, disillusioned with past profits, hold on to the rails as the boat sinks, along with all the fish who are wasting time and money on this platform.

[AlexGR]

After thinking of it, I think it's unlikely the issue of "just rewards" to be solved by a single-dimensional algorithm.

Meaning, that it will probably require a multi-tiered approach by combining things like

a) author long-term "reputation"
b) author ratings by large or appointed curators who may do this manually
c) post ratings with something like a star system which build (a)
d) voting

...then all these should be weight-combined so that the first page displays not the highest earner (unless asked so by the drop down filter), but the higher combined quality/voting.

Whether segmentation of interest groups plays a role, I don't know. What I do know, is that the algorithm will have to evolve - and it will.

Another idea that sprung to mind, was the "request" of a user to be "evaluated" for quality. After writing his post down and before pressing submit, user pays a fixed amount of STEEM (like 1-2-5 steem) to apply for a "curators review" within the next 30 minutes or so... (money goes to curator or curators - no matter what the curator decides), and the post then gets a "quality multiplier" depending what the curator decided. Then the quality post starts at a different "base" level compared to the normal posts and thus attracts more attention from the get go. In case the curator-(p)reviewer misbehaves and the quality of the post is crap, a flagging/downvoting will remove a multiple of what the curator gained.

[iamnotback]

The problem with your solution is that implementing it, while improving the quality of the platform as a whole, would not be in the best interests of the developers. Simply put, people are only using Steemit to make money. Nobody is saying "Wow, look at the quality of content on Steemit!" The ONLY draw to the platform is the profit possibilities. By fragmenting voting into niches, there will no longer be posts earning tens of thousands of dollars.

My proposal would perhaps turn 1000 Steem posts into perhaps 100 Steem posts, but likely Steem would thus be 10X higher in price because of the greater participation and utility. So nothing lost and only gained.

[jeffthebaker]

The problem with your solution is that implementing it, while improving the quality of the platform as a whole, would not be in the best interests of the developers. Simply put, people are only using Steemit to make money. Nobody is saying "Wow, look at the quality of content on Steemit!" The ONLY draw to the platform is the profit possibilities. By fragmenting voting into niches, there will no longer be posts earning tens of thousands of dollars.

My proposal would perhaps turn 1000 Steem posts into perhaps 100 Steem posts, but likely Steem would thus be 10X higher in price because of the greater participation and utility. So nothing lost and only gained.

You're falling under the inaccurate assumption that a 10x better system will = 10x the investments into the system. The people making big bucks off of Steem don't want to fix the system. It's broken in their favor. While new investors may see such a change as a better chance of earning, the people holding and distributing Steem will see it as absolute loss of profit. If whales are dumping, even if the fish are pumping, the price is not going to hold, and certainly won't appreciate 10x.

[CoinHoarder]

Anonymint. You are on the right track.

Better content on the front pages

100 people getting $1000 is better than 10 people getting $10,000

win/win

I see the merit in your idea, and I think most Steemians would too. Jeff just really hates Steem for some reason(s).

[CoinHoarder]

There sure are a lot of big names participating in this...investment scenario. Anything for a buck. Right fellas?

Wow respect, i see some people who usually stand on morale high ground here defending and shilling for such a scam mining.... wtf is going on here.

I'm as perplexed, trust no one.

soon this pyramid will collapse and everyone will look silly.

I notice none of you "holier than thou" types were able to provide a rebuttal to my post:

Morals are subjective. They are derived from religion and one's upbringing, and everyone forms their own version of morals as they experience life.

To some a "sneaky mine" is immoral. Others may liken it to starting a business, and equate it to the developers/organizers of a start up obtaining equity in their project. Are all start ups and corporations immoral? Is capitalism immoral? That is subjective...

To some 12% annual inflation is an unsustainable pyramid scheme. Others may liken it as a good way to gain a huge userbase quickly, then leverage that userbase in the form of profitable features that are yet to be implemented. Can a business not change its business plan, or never expand into other markets? To judge something based on exactly how it exists today instead of where it is headed in the future may be a mistake.

[CoinHoarder]

newbies tricked into thinking that they, too, can turn a profit.

The bolded is an inaccurate statement. No one is being tricked, as it is indeed possible. I have been able to earn $851.43 without buying any STEEM, and I know of many other people that have as well simply by posting content, comments, and curating. Anyone can do it if they are patient enough. Is it easy? No, but if someone gives up easily, or never really gives it an effort like you or the other trolls here on Bitcointalk, then it is misleading and untrue to call it impossible. It is certainly not impossible to make decent money if you work hard at it. It is a numbers game. Ask 10 girls out and 9 will say no, but eventually 1 will say yes. Steemit works similarly. Keep producing quality posts and comments, and eventually you will be noticed. Compared to other social networks that pay you nothing- Steemit pays 100% more. I've never seen a cent from Facebook, but I've been using it religously since 2005.

Ultimately they are just going to make money until people wisen up and stop buying into this massive bubble.

Everyone said the same thing about Ethereum, but that bubble never popped. The fact is no one can tell the future. Steemit has more utility than Ethereum at the moment, so I can see it easily surpassing Ethereum's market capitalization for the time being.

The people making big bucks off of Steem don't want to fix the system. It's broken in their favor.

That is another lie. The developers, which are the biggest whales, are working hard to improve the ecosystem and platform.

Two changes in the past two days intended to help fix the ecosystem:
https://github.com/steemit/steem/issues/177
https://github.com/steemit/steem/issues/178

According to Github, there have been 21 releases and 599 commits since March. They are as dedicated as any other development team, probably much more so than a majority of other cryptocurrencies.

Furthermore, it is in their best interest to fix Steem and make it the best they can be because they can't dump (see below) and most of the value of their holdings is held in SP. If the value doesn't hold for 2 years, they are going to be much worse off than their paper balances look right now.

If whales are dumping, even if the fish are pumping, the price is not going to hold, and certainly won't appreciate 10x.

You do realize that whales can only dump in 104 weekly payments over the course of 2 years? Steem is pretty well protected from "whale dumps" as compared to any other cryptocurrency. In any other cryptocurrency the whales can dump whenever and however much they want to.

[iamnotback]

The problem with your solution is that implementing it, while improving the quality of the platform as a whole, would not be in the best interests of the developers. Simply put, people are only using Steemit to make money. Nobody is saying "Wow, look at the quality of content on Steemit!" The ONLY draw to the platform is the profit possibilities. By fragmenting voting into niches, there will no longer be posts earning tens of thousands of dollars.

My proposal would perhaps turn 1000 Steem posts into perhaps 100 Steem posts, but likely Steem would thus be 10X higher in price because of the greater participation and utility. So nothing lost and only gained.

You're falling under the inaccurate assumption that a 10x better system will = 10x the investments into the system. The people making big bucks off of Steem don't want to fix the system. It's broken in their favor. While new investors may see such a change as a better chance of earning, the people holding and distributing Steem will see it as absolute loss of profit. If whales are dumping, even if the fish are pumping, the price is not going to hold, and certainly won't appreciate 10x.

The people making the biggest bucks such as Ned, Dan, and smooth, most definitely do want to fix the system so they can maximize the price of their Steem Power tokens. They aren't making big money off of blog posts, compared to the $10 millions value of their SP holdings. The people who've made big money on blog posts only have in the $200k range of SP, and they also want to do what is best for the long-term value of their holdings because they are not acting selfish.

I have other serious and significant reservations about the viability of the system (which I am trying to devise solutions for and frankly it looks bleak at the moment), but the rewards can be improved. The price is going up and will probably continue to go up for weeks or months. It is better to ride the train than try to stand in front of it.

[jeffthebaker]

Anonymint. You are on the right track.

Better content on the front pages

100 people getting $1000 is better than 10 people getting $10,000

win/win

I see the merit in your idea, and I think most Steemians would too. Jeff just really hates Steem for some reason(s).

You want to know why I hate Steem? Is it because I'm tired of seeing steemit links to blogs with just pennies in payment? Is it because quality plays a minimal factor in success of posts and authors? Is it because it is a blatant scam and bound to fail eventually? No. These are all reasons to dislike Steemit, but not why I hate it.

I've been involved in the crypto scene for a long time. For years, the general perception of Bitcoin was it was just another scam, a Ponzi. Over time, this perception has changed. Way back when, the idea that public would adopt crypto seemed like a shot in the dark. Every day, however, more and more people are looking into cryptocurrency seriously. The fabled "mass adoption" is still very far away, but it's also closer than it was before. Why? Because the community as a whole is working to shed the negative image that much of the public sees Bitcoin and crypto with.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for pump and dumps and other scamcoins. I make my Bitcoin trading shitcoins. I go on Yobit every day and I buy and sell coins I know have absolutely no purpose. I invest in ICOs knowing that the people who buy in after me are going to lose money. So what's the difference between a scam like Steem and a scam like the shitcoins I encourage?

Steem, like PayCoin, OneCoin, and other awful, awful past crypto scams, pray on the general public. When someone makes a shitcoin to list on Yobit, that's fine, because everyone involved is gambling against each other, they know what they are getting in to. But Steem doesn't do that. As many have mentioned, the BCT thread, twitter account, and other forms of common exposure are very small for the size of the coin. People are being manipulated into joining this system outside of the crypto community. Someone said their mom started using Steemit. This is absolutely unacceptable, because these unknowing individuals are wasting their time and money to contribute to a massive scheme.

It's counterintuitive to the positive image the crypto community has been trying to build for years. What do you think would happen if, rather than in a few weeks (which will probably be the case), Steem keeps growing at the same unsustainable rate for a few months? What if it doesn't finally collapse until hundreds of thousands of people buy in? That would be fucking awesome for you and others who are fully into it right now, but what about the rest of the crypto community? What about the long term? Steemit can kill the trust the public has in cryptocurrency, the trust that is an absolute requirement for "the moon", or whatever you want to call a prosperous future for all of us.

Steem is a scam, and every member in this forum worth their salt either recognizes it or is benefiting from it.

[iamnotback]

Steem, like PayCoin, OneCoin, and other awful, awful past crypto scams, pray on the general public. When someone makes a shitcoin to list on Yobit, that's fine, because everyone involved is gambling against each other, they know what they are getting in to. But Steem doesn't do that. As many have mentioned, the BCT thread, twitter account, and other forms of common exposure are very small for the size of the coin. People are being manipulated into joining this system outside of the crypto community. Someone said their mom started using Steemit. This is absolutely unacceptable, because these unknowing individuals are wasting their time and money to contribute to a massive scheme.

It's counterintuitive to the positive image the crypto community has been trying to build for years. What do you think would happen if, rather than in a few weeks (which will probably be the case), Steem keeps growing at the same unsustainable rate for a few months? What if it doesn't finally collapse until hundreds of thousands of people buy in? That would be fucking awesome for you and others who are fully into it right now, but what about the rest of the crypto community? What about the long term? Steemit can kill the trust the public has in cryptocurrency, the trust that is an absolute requirement for "the moon", or whatever you want to call a prosperous future for all of us.

Steem is a scam, and every member in this forum worth their salt either recognizes it or is benefiting from it.

The users who are signing up for free are not going to lose anything but their time and effort, and I presume they already know the Internet is an adventure.

As for those who buy into the speculative bubble, it will not reach grandma and your mom on this first early-adopter speculative run. Long before that happens it will either morph into a viable long-term project or fail. Bitcoin did not reach grandma and mom on its first speculative bubble to $1200.

Relax and enjoy the experiment. We will learn from it.

I believe the creators of Steemit really think it can work. Dan is delusional that way. He always has been, so it is not out-of-character (and I don't mean that to make him my enemy, as they are talented programmers apparently but I am just speaking frankly about his "build it and they will come" which is the same flaw in DEX in that users will always prefer the more liquid Poloniex). The main flaw in Steem's business model is that CC is not adopted for transactions unless it provides a unique feature that can't be done with fiat since otherwise fiat is preferred because it is our unit-of-account. For Bitcoin that was permission-free money transfers. Steem has currently no unique transaction use case for its token. Merchants will simply accept Steem via Bitpay (or clone) but that won't be the only way to pay the merchant, so no net demand created for the Steem token. That is the bleak problem I see, but I am trying to think of a solution.

[CoinHoarder]

Jeff just really hates Steem for some reason(s).

You want to know why I hate Steem? Is it because I'm tired of seeing steemit links to blogs with just pennies in payment? Is it because quality plays a minimal factor in success of posts and authors? Is it because it is a blatant scam and bound to fail eventually? No. These are all reasons to dislike Steemit, but not why I hate it.

I've been involved in the crypto scene for a long time. For years, the general perception of Bitcoin was it was just another scam, a Ponzi. Over time, this perception has changed. Way back when, the idea that public would adopt crypto seemed like a shot in the dark. Every day, however, more and more people are looking into cryptocurrency seriously. The fabled "mass adoption" is still very far away, but it's also closer than it was before. Why? Because the community as a whole is working to shed the negative image that much of the public sees Bitcoin and crypto with.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for pump and dumps and other scamcoins. I make my Bitcoin trading shitcoins. I go on Yobit every day and I buy and sell coins I know have absolutely no purpose. I invest in ICOs knowing that the people who buy in after me are going to lose money. So what's the difference between a scam like Steem and a scam like the shitcoins I encourage?

Steem, like PayCoin, OneCoin, and other awful, awful past crypto scams, pray on the general public. When someone makes a shitcoin to list on Yobit, that's fine, because everyone involved is gambling against each other, they know what they are getting in to. But Steem doesn't do that. As many have mentioned, the BCT thread, twitter account, and other forms of common exposure are very small for the size of the coin. People are being manipulated into joining this system outside of the crypto community. Someone said their mom started using Steemit. This is absolutely unacceptable, because these unknowing individuals are wasting their time and money to contribute to a massive scheme.

It's counterintuitive to the positive image the crypto community has been trying to build for years. What do you think would happen if, rather than in a few weeks (which will probably be the case), Steem keeps growing at the same unsustainable rate for a few months? What if it doesn't finally collapse until hundreds of thousands of people buy in? That would be fucking awesome for you and others who are fully into it right now, but what about the rest of the crypto community? What about the long term? Steemit can kill the trust the public has in cryptocurrency, the trust that is an absolute requirement for "the moon", or whatever you want to call a prosperous future for all of us.

Steem is a scam, and every member in this forum worth their salt either recognizes it or is benefiting from it.

With all due respect, I think you are smart enough to understand how big of a hypocrite you are being. I hardly think this post warrants a response, but I'll bite.

Who do you think loses the most in the pump and dumps and scam coins you promote and profit off of? New people to the cryptocurrency community who are inexperienced. You are preying on the general public you claim to care so much about. Enough with the "holier than thou" attitude.

New comers are not speculating by buying Steem any more so than any other pump and dump or scam coin that you apparently champion. Most are earning their way in by simply spending time posting and curating content. "Blogging is the new mining". It is simply a new and different distribution method rather than the same old PoW, giveaway, or ICO. If you think it is too hard to earn money that way then move along, that means more rewards for the rest of us, but don't for a second delude yourself into thinking you are better than any of us.